PLYMOUTH, Mass. — A Plymouth Superior Court judge on Monday denied Lindsay Clancy's motion to dismiss the murder charges against her, clearing the way for a possible second trial in the deaths of her three children in Duxbury.

Judge William F. Sullivan ruled that the jury's deadlock in Clancy's first trial created "manifest necessity" for the mistrial he declared Sept. 4, so trying her again would not violate her constitutional protection against being tried twice for the same crime.

"Because the court concludes that there was manifest necessity for a mistrial based on the jury's deadlock, a retrial on the murder indictments does not violate Clancy's right not to be placed in double jeopardy," Sullivan wrote, according to ABC News.

Jurors in the first trial reported they were deadlocked 11-1, with 11 favoring acquittal on the grounds that Clancy was not criminally responsible, The Boston Globe reported. The jury foreperson wrote that the lone holdout refused to follow the judge's instructions on reasonable doubt.

Clancy's lawyers argued Sullivan should have investigated whether the holdout juror could be removed and replaced with an alternate instead of declaring a mistrial, Yahoo News reported. In his 17-page ruling, Sullivan wrote that "the Court's primary concern must be protecting the fairness of the proceedings and avoiding the possibility of a coerced verdict," according to the Globe.

Juror inquiry and gag order rejected

Sullivan also denied the defense's request for records about the holdout juror, including the juror's questionnaire and cellphone records, and for sworn testimony about the juror's answers during jury selection, according to Yahoo News. He found the material was not relevant to the double jeopardy question.

He also rejected the prosecution's request for a gag order that would have barred the defense team from speaking publicly about the case while it is pending, the Globe reported. Sullivan found prosecutors had not shown a serious enough threat of harm to justify restricting speech in advance, and he left them room to ask again, according to Yahoo News.

What's next

Sullivan has scheduled a Nov. 17 hearing to set a tentative date for a retrial, the Globe reported. Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz has not said whether he will retry Clancy on first-degree murder charges, according to the Globe. At a hearing Nov. 2, prosecutor Jennifer Sprague said the state plans a retrial, ABC News reported.

Clancy, 36, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of her children Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, at the family's Duxbury home on Jan. 24, 2023, according to the Globe. Prosecutors say she strangled the children, then cut her wrists and neck and jumped from a second-story window, injuries that left her paralyzed from the waist down.

Prosecutors argued at trial that the killings were premeditated. Clancy's defense says she was suffering from postpartum mental illness and is not criminally responsible, the Globe reported. The charges are allegations, and Clancy is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.